GAME OF PING-PONG MARKS MEETING OF THE MINDS
BETWEEN TWO ARTISTS AND THEIR ARCHITECTURAL LANDSCAPES
Stephen Hendee & Phoebe Washburn
Ping-Pong Diplomacy
March 11-May 14, 2006
Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art
4420 Warwick Blvd.
Kansas City, Missouri 64111
Tel 816-753-5784 Fax 816-753-5806
Open Tues.Thurs. 104,
Fri.Sat.109, Sun. 115
Free admission and parking
kemperart.org
An upcoming exhibition at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art takes a closer look at how two emerging artists use low-tech, common materials to create larger-than life sculptural environments that fuse together architecture and landscape and playfully negotiate different aesthetics. Ping-Pong Diplomacy: Stephen Hendee & Phoebe Washburn, on view March 11May 14 at the Kemper Museum, features two major site-specific installations by Stephen Hendee and Phoebe Washburn, and includes a ping-pong table designed in tandem by both artists located at the center of the gallery, where visitors can reflect on the exhibitions duality while playing a game or two. The show opens with a free public reception Saturday, March 11, 5:307:30 p.m.
Taking a historic 1971 table tennis tournament as its point of reference, Ping-Pong Diplomacy explores the idea of working out differences through play by bringing together two artists who follow similar rules to express divergent styles and concepts. Stephen Hendee, who is based in Las Vegas, uses simple materials like corrugated plastic sheets, photo tape, fluorescent lights, and hot glue to create multi-faceted, glowing, geometric landscapes that summon comparisons to the stage sets of science-fiction films, like the 1982 cult classic Tron. While the ambiance is one of virtual reality and cyberspace, Hendees otherworldly forms shape interiors in a way that is strangely organicthe geometry of his works move and bend in unexpected and spontaneous ways, like rock formations. Additionally, his surfaces are often disrupted by zigzagging lines of black tape that mirror the tangled topography of highways and inspire associations with the unchecked growth of urban sprawl.
Similarly, Phoebe Washburn, a New York-based artist, also comments on urban sprawl by composing works with post-consumerist materials she discovers and collects from loading docks, alleyways, and dumpsters. Using these seemingly basic materials that reflect a society of excess, Washburn creates intricate, tumbling architectural landscapes fused together in a way that is disjointed, random, and largely improvisational. Considering herself an anti-builder builder, Washburn aligns her practice with that of spontaneous architecture, a loosely defined type of construction that makes use of whatever materials are at hand (or can be scrounged up) and then put to use in inventive ways. Washburn has cited shantytowns as an inspiration for her inventive, chaotic terrestrial formations, which often include living, growing plants among the debris-strewn topography.
While both Hendee and Washburn rely on basic materials and subtly comment on significant social and geo-political issues, they also bring together two very distinct aesthetics. Hendee and Washburn pursue much different deliveriesat the most basic level, Hendees works are graceful, restrained, seductive, and ethereal, while Washburns are clumsy, impulsive, awkward, and terrestrial. Seen together occupying a single space … their respective works suggest the meeting of heaven and earth, Kemper Museum curator Elizabeth Dunbar writes in her exhibition essay.
Hendee and Washburn are visiting artists at the Kemper Museum. A brochure, including Dunbars essay and a dialogue between the artists, accompanies the exhibition.
About the Kemper Museum
Kansas Citys acclaimed, free contemporary art museum, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art opened in 1994 and draws more than 130,000 visitors each year. The Museum boasts a rapidly growing permanent collection of modern and contemporary works of artists from around the world. The Museum hosts temporary exhibitions, installations, performance work, film and video series, lectures, concerts, childrens workshops, and other creative programs designed to both entertain and challenge. For more information, visit www.kemperart.org.
The Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art is open 10:00 a.m.4:00 p.m., TuesdayThursday; 10:00 a.m.9:00 p.m., FridaySaturday; and 11:00 a.m.5:00 p.m., Sunday. The galleries at Kemper East (200 E. 44th Street) are open 10:00 a.m.4:00 p.m., TuesdayThursday. The Museums popular Café Sebastienne serves lunch 11:00 a.m.2:30 p.m., TuesdaySaturday; dinner 5:309:30 p.m., FridaySaturday; and brunch 11:00 a.m.2:30 p.m., Sunday. The Museum and Café are closed on Mondays.
For more information contact:
Margaret Keough at 816-457-6132 or margaret@kemperart.org or Becca Ramspott (Tues.Thurs.) at 816-457-6140 or bramspott@kemperart.org
